Marc Thorpe
Marc Thorpe was a San Francisco-based electronics and model designer and engineer, and is best known for being the founder of Robot Wars in 1995. In the TV show, Marc Thorpe appeared in The Third Wars, handing the trophy to Team Razer at the end of the International League Championship, also shown in The First World Championship. Creation of Robot Wars Marc Thorpe is perhaps best known for being the founder of Robot Wars. The concept of Robot Wars was first thought of in 1992 as a new form of "gladiatorial event" using RC Robots to compete, with Marc Thorpe himself creating concept designs of what type of robots he wanted to appear, although they weren't functional.http://www.marcthorpe.com/robot-wars/ In early 1994, Thorpe sent a promotional package for the inaugural US Robot Wars event to Wired magazine; a few days later, the magazine contacted him, stating that they wanted to produce photographs and an article on the event. Realising that he did not have a functioning robot ready, Thorpe modified his tank further to incorporate a top-mounted chainsaw bought from a hardware store. Although the chainsaw was not functional, photographer Bill Zemenek was impressed with the robot; both the article and the accompanying photograph appeared in the February 1994 edition of Wired, the former written by Jef Raskin.https://www.wired.com/1994/03/robot-war-games/ The success of this event lead to three further competitions taking place between 1995 and 1997. Approximately one month prior to the first event, Thorpe formed a partnership with New York-based record company Profile Records. In 1995, Profile Records partnered with production company Mentorn to produce and televise a Robot Wars event in the UK. Mentorn acquired the worldwide television rights from Profile later that year, and Tom Gutteridge and Steve Carsey created the television format from the original Robot Wars concept. Robot Wars on TV Behind the scenes of Robot Wars: The First Wars, Marc Thorpe was present and was a consultant for Mentorn on the show, which resulted in the First Wars becoming a major success with over two million viewers and more episodes commissioned by the BBC. Thorpe was later invited to appear for the filming of The First World Championship and International League Championship, both filmed during the Third Wars. He was personally responsible for giving Team Razer the trophy for their victories over Behemoth and Diotoir in each respective tournament. Before giving out the trophy, Thorpe was interviewed by Philippa Forrester about his thoughts on Razer. Thorpe handed the trophy to Team Razer and shook hands with the team as they celebrated their victories. Marc Thorpe was also interviewed by Robo Challenge as part of their book, Robot Wars: Build Your Own Robot. Outside Robot Wars In 1974, Marc received a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts for a year-long Dolphin Performance Project at Marineland in Florida. The project itself involved training two young female dolphins, called Betty and Eva, to swim sustained synchronous swimming patterns conceived as “behavioural sculpture.”http://www.marcthorpe.com/about-us/ In 1979, Marc Thorpe had joined LucasFilm and continued to work there until 1994 as chief model maker/animatronic designer, creating special effects for feature films, including those in the Star Wars and Indiana Jones franchises, before moving towards inventing toys for LucasToys in the later part of his career. Thorpe's attempt to pitch a 'destructive vehicles'-themed toy line for them, 'Danger Zone', eventually inspired him to create and develop the concept of the original US Robot Wars events. Marc Thorpe discussed the origins of Robot Wars in a video interview with Stephen McCulla, celebrating the twentieth anniversary of televised Robot Wars. With help from the Free Shipping team, Marc Thorpe was host to a "watch party" for an episode of BattleBots in 2019 https://tinyurl.com/y4d3mj26. Trivia *Marc Thorpe expressed a strong dislike of BattleBots, the competing US counterpart to Robot Wars. After watching the show twice, he voiced negative opinions of how the show contained sexual innuendos, parodies of sports such as basketball and American football, and the forced nature to make the roboteers' unconventional behaviour more obvious.Gearheads: The Turbulent Rise of Robotic Sports References External Links *Marc Thorpe's website Category:Robotics industry professionals Category:Production Crew